Introduction

Power Point has everything you need to create an effective presentation. It allows you to create descriptive slides to enhance the presentation with visual aids. One can use Power Point for creating black and white or colored transparencies, on screen electronic presentation, or 35mm slides. Furthermore, Power Point provides opportunity to create notes attached to each specific slide for personal use, and it allows for the audience to obtain their personal copy of the slides you created. Power Point has a number of features to magnify the audience's attention.

Power Point scrolls, prints, and saves in the same manner as Word

To begin Power Point, you must first activate it.

This is done as follows:

In the Olds/Upton Mac Lab:

1. Drag the mouse arrow over the colored apple in the upper-left hand corner. Press and hold the mouse button on the apple. A small window should appear containing applications and folders.

2. While still holding the mouse button down, drag the mouse over the folder labeled "Writing/Design". A second small window should appear containing a number of applications.

3. Look for the application entitled "Power Point". The mouse button should still be pressed at this point. Drag the mouse arrow over the application "Power Point"; and release the mouse button.

After a few seconds (perhaps longer), Power Point will load onto your screen.

Exercise 1 - Starting Up Power Point

Try starting up Power Point as described above.

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If you are having trouble, please ask your professor or a lab assistance.

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New Presentation

If a tip of the day appears, go ahead and read it, and then click on okay. Furthermore, if a custom settings error window appears, click on okay also.

What you will find next is a display box containing four different options: AutoContent Wizard, Pick a Look Wizard, Template, or Blank Presentation. These options can be selected by pressing on the circle on the left. You will notice that only one selection can be obtained. Click on the circle next to "Blank Presentation".; You should notice that the circle is now filled and the circle next to "AutoContent Wizard" is empty. Clicking on "Help" will give you a small description of each option. Click on the "Help" button now. To exit the help menu: Click on the small square in the upper left hand corner of the document. Once again you are faced with the same five options. The next exercises will carry you through each option separately.

Exercise 2 - AutoContent Wizard

1. Click on the circle on the left side of AutoContent Wizard and Click on the "OK" button.

2. Read the first page and Click on the "Next" button. As you can see a title slide will be created for you. Enter in Why I Love CS 400 in the box under "What are you going to talk about?" Next Highlight the entire box under "What is your name?" Highlight can be accomplished by placing your mouse arrow on the left side and pressing the mouse button down. While pressing the mouse button drag the arrow across the text "Computer_Services@Olds_Upton_Lab". Release the mouse button.--OR-- **Once you complete Why I Love CS 400 press the "TAB" button on the keyboard.** At this point type in YOURNAME. (i.e. Kevin Arnold). Click on "Next" to continue.

3. You should now be able to select the type of presentation you want to give. Click on "Recommending a Strategy". You should notice that the document on the left contains a general setup relating to the type of presentation you selected. Now Click on the remaining selections in order from top to bottom. Notice the different headings for each presentation. Upon reaching and reading "General", Click on "Next."

4. You should be ready to create your first presentation. Click on Finish.

**Before we return back to the other options, it is best to grasp some of abilities to navigate through Power Point.

Navigation

Once you have created the default text, changes can be made to your slides, notes can be created for the presenter, and even a print out of the slides can be given to the audience. All of this is can be accomplished by understanding your toolbars.

The following exercise helps define and locate some of those tools:

Exercise 3 - Navigating inside Power Point

1. You should be looking at an outline of slides. Each number down the outline is the slide number. Slide 1 or the "Title slide" was created during the AutoContent Wizard set-up. This should now state "Why I Love CS 400" and underneath YOURNAME.

2. Direct your attention to the lower left hand corner of your display window. You should see a toolbar containing five tools. Place your mouse arrow over any of the tools and WITHOUT clicking it wait a couple of seconds. At the bottom of the screen you should see a description of the tool. Furthermore, a small, yellow box will appear naming the tool. Take a look at each tool and read the description.

3. Now Click on the "Slide Sorter View."

4. You should be looking at all your slides lined up in order by number. Notice the second tool bar from the top. Click on the tool named "Transition." -- It is located on the left side! If you are unaware of this tool, use your new ability of placing the mouse arrow over the tool and read the descriptive, yellow boxes to locate the tool named "Transition".

Professional Look

A slide presentation can be improved in various ways. The many features of Power Point allow you to spice up your presentation a little. These features include Effect, Speed, Advancement, Hiding Slides, and Rehearsal timings. (Color will be covered in another section.)

In the following Exercise you will learn how to use these tools:

Exercise 4 - Getting the Professional look

1. A display window will appear containing EFFECT, SPEED, and ADVANCE. Effect is the "effect" on how a slide is removed to see the next slide in a slide show. Check out some of the possibilities by Clicking and Holding the mouse button down on "No Transition". You should see a whole list of possibilities. When you Release the mouse button on a choice (i.e. Box In) a slide will cover the dog in the lower right hand corner. Speed is how fast you want the effect to take place, and Advance is whether you want the slides to shuffle through manually or automatically. ** At this time place the Effect back to No Transition.

2. As you can see there is a "Effect" button titled "No Transition" on your toolbar. Therefore you can select each card an individual Effect or you can Go to Edit/Select All, and that will highlight all your slides so that you can give them all an effect without having to visit them all at the same time.

3. Skip over the next two tools: entitled "Build" and "No Build Effect". (If you are interested in those tools Go to the "?"; in the upper right hand corner and Click on "Search for help on" and Type Build Slide in the search box.) Hide Slide is the next tool that is valuable in a presentation. You can create slides that may be used only when a situation arises to use them. For example, if someone wants to see your math that resulted in your solution. You can create this slide and hide it until a person directly asks for it. Click on Slide number 3. It should be highlighted (-or a black box around its edges). Now Click on the tool "Hide Slide". You should notice that the number is now crossed out. During a regular presentation, it will not appear. However, you can make it appear during a presentation by clicking on the clover inside a box on the slide before the hidden slide. Therefore, you must decide on whether or not you want to initiate the hidden slide on the slide just before it. **

4. The next tool is the one with the clock. If you notice it is called the "Rehearse Timings" tool. It allows you not only to time your speech but time each slide. Click on "Rehearse Timings" and when you want to finish the slide Click on the clock.

Pick a Look Wizard

As you can see there are many options in Power Point, but they are not finished yet! Go to "New" as you would in a Word document. This time Click on the circle next to "Pick a Look Wizard" and Click on "OK." The first slide introduces you to "Pick a Look Wizard," (Click on "Next") and the next slide gives you an option on what kind of presentation your are going to give. At this point you are interested in making an "On-Screen Presentation", so Click on "Next". Now you are given one of Pick a Look Wizard's great features, selecting a background. Cycle through all the options until you find one that fits your desire. If the first four don't interest you Click on "More...", and you should choose from a wider selection. Now Click on "Next". The next slides gives you an option on how you want to print the slides you are going to create. Go ahead and leave them all checked. Click on "Next". The fourth step gives you the option of placing your name, date and slide number on the your Presentation. Click on all the boxes and type your name in the highlighted box. Click on "Next". Click on "Finish", and you are ready to create your presentation. Notice that you only created your first slide. However, your name is in the lower left hand corner, the date is in the center, and your page number is in the right hand corner. Furthermore, you have the background of your choice. At this time please Save this presentation to your disk. (As learned in the Word Processing Lab). Once the presentation is saved, Close the presentation. This can be done by going to "File/Close".

Template and Blank Presentation

Once again Go to "File/New". At this point you want to Click on "Template", and Click on "OK". As you can see you are given three folders titled "B&W Overheads", "Color Overheads", and "On Screen and 35mm Slides". Each folder contains backgrounds for a slide presentation. Furthermore, by selecting one of these choices you set the default of the print to create these particular presentations. Click on "Cancel", and Go to "File/New". At this point you would like to Click on "Blank Presentation", and Click on "OK".

In this exercise you will be able to choose different from 21 different slide layouts:

Exercise 5-Layouts

1. Notice the display box now presented to you. It is entitled "New Slide". This display box will appear to you every time you select new slide while creating your presentation. On the left side are the 21 different layouts, and on the right side are three buttons and a title to the layout highlighted. ** Click on a couple of different layouts and notice the title changing in the "Title Box".

2. Click on the layout titled "Title Slide", and Click on "OK". You should be presented with a slide with a white background and two dotted boxes similar to the structure you selected in the "New Slide" display window. At this point Click on the box entitled "Click to add title". Notice the text is replaced with a cursor. Enter Why I Love CS 400. Click on "Click to add sub-title", and Enter YOURNAME.

3. Notice the three buttons in the lower right hand corner: New Slide, Layout, and Template. Click on "New Slide". Once again, Click on the layout titled "Title Slide" and Click on "OK". OOOOPPPPSSS! You made a mistake. You don't need two title slides. Well that is okay, you don't need to delete that slide. You can click on the button titled "Layout". At this point Click on "Text and Clip Art", and Click on "Apply".

Color

Color can help modify a simple black on white text to a highly organized colored presentation. Color can be used to emphasize words or make text readable on a dark colored background. Color makes a difference in a presentation. It gives the look to the presentation.

In the following exercise you are going to add color to your background and to your text:

Exercise 6-Color

1. Click on "Format/Slide Background". A display window will appear containing options to change your background. First, you should cycle through the "Shade Styles" and determine whether you would like to add that feature to your background. Second, you should Click on "Change Color". You are given a new window with a variety of colors. Choose among the ones listed. If none of those are quite the color you are looking for you can Click on "More Colors". This will present you with all the colors available to the computer. ** If you decided on shading: When you are finished deciding your color, choose the light to dark scroll bar to determine how dark or light you would like your shading to look. Your last Choice is to determine whether or not you want this background to apply to all or just to the slide you are creating. Click on the button that is appropriate: "Apply to All" or "Apply".

2. Click on "Format/Slide Color Scheme". You are presented with eight color boxes. Each are titled corresponding to the color they represent. You should notice that the color of background is the one you choose in the first portion of this exercise. Furthermore, you can change your text, text titles, accents, fillings and shadows. Some text does not appear on your screen easily with certain colors. You can use "Change Color" to change any of the features. However, you must first Click On the color of the feature you want to change. It will highlight the box once you have successfully clicked on it. At this point, you can Click on "Change Color" and change to the color to your desire. Do so now. Again you must choose whether to "Apply to All" or "Apply".

** A side point: If you decide now that you would rather have a background setting that is in "Pick a Look Wizard". You do not need to start new. You can go to "Format/Pick a Look Wizard" -- and it will take you threw the steps as shown above in the Pick a Look Wizard exercise.

Adding Pictures

By selecting certain layouts you are given the opportunity to add pictures, documents, and even drawings to your presentation. These can be something of which your created or found on the software. Graphs and pictures bring your presentations to life; you are not just showing your note cards on the screen. Clip Art has a wide variety of pictures that can be added. Furthermore, you can add a graph that you created from Excel.

The following exercise will add a picture from Clip Art to your slide:

Exercise 7- Clip Art

1. Double Click on the man asking you to "Double click to add clip art".

2. In the window there are all the pictures available in Clip Art. You can narrow your search down by choosing a select topic list from the top. Let us try! Click on "Maps-U.S." Now Look through the available pictures and find the map of Texas. If you are unaware what this map looks like click on a map and look at the scroll bar at the bottom of the screen it labels the map. Click on the map of Texas and Click on "OK".

3. If you are interested: When you want to change a picture that is already placed. All you need to do is double click on the picture and it will give you a chanve to change the Clip Art.

Create a title and some text for this slide. Save this presentation also to your disk.

Exiting From Power Point

Once you are finished using Power Point, you must exit from it. Before doing this, however, make sure that you have saved the presentation. If you have not, when you exit it will ask you if you want to. When this display box appears, you should select Save.

To exit Power Point:

Go to "File/Quit"

Conclusions

You have now seen the fundamental concepts of a using Power Point. If you have never used Power Point before, I recommend that you practice by creating various presentations. Please take the time to go over this lab again. A experienced user can produce a quality presentation in a small amount of time. You will find Power Point very useful in your time spent here at Kalamazoo College.